M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
2 Then we turned and traveled toward the wilderness on the road to the Red Sea, as the Lord had told me, and we traveled for many days to get around the area of Mount Seir.[a]
The Journey Past Edom
2 Then the Lord said to me, 3 “You have been traveling around this mountainous region long enough. Turn north 4 and command the people, ‘You are about to pass through the territory of your brothers, the people of Esau, who are living in Seir, and they will be afraid of you. So be very careful. 5 Do not wage war against them because I am not going to give you any of their land, not even an area the size of a footprint, because I have given the Mount Seir region to Esau as a possession. 6 You may buy food from them with money so you can eat, and you may purchase water from them with money so you can drink. 7 For the Lord your God has blessed you in all the work of your hands. He knows your trek through this vast wilderness. These forty years the Lord your God has been with you. You have not lacked anything.’” 8 So we passed by the territory of our brothers, the people of Esau, who were living in Seir. After leaving the Arabah Road, Elat, and Ezion Geber behind us, we turned and we traveled along the road of the Wilderness of Moab.
The Journey Past Moab
9 Then the Lord said to me, “Do not be hostile toward Moab and do not wage war against them in battle, because I am not going to give you any of their land as a possession, since I have given Ar to the people of Lot as a possession.”
10 (The Emites formerly lived in it, a strong, numerous people and tall like the Anakites. 11 They, like the Anakites, are also considered to be Rephaim,[b] but the Moabites call them Emites. 12 The Horites also lived in Seir formerly, but the people of Esau took possession of their land and destroyed them from their midst. They settled there in their place, just as Israel did in the land that the Lord gave to them as their possession.)
13 Then the Lord told us:[c] “Now get ready and cross the Zered Canyon.” So we crossed over the Zered Canyon. 14 The time that we traveled from Kadesh Barnea until we crossed over the Zered Canyon was thirty-eight years, until that whole generation of fighting men were eliminated from the camp, just as the Lord had sworn to them. 15 Yes indeed, the hand of the Lord was against them to destroy them from the camp until they were eliminated.
The Journey Past Ammon
16 Just as soon as all those fighting men were eliminated from the people by their death, 17 the Lord spoke to me: 18 “Today you are going to cross the border of Moab at Ar. 19 When you come near the people of Ammon, do not be hostile toward them and do not wage war against them, because I am not going to give any of the land of the people of Ammon to you as a possession, since I have given it to the people of Lot as a possession.”
20 (It also is considered to be the land of the Rephaim. The Rephaim lived in it formerly, but the Ammonites call them Zamzumites. 21 They are a strong and numerous people and as tall as the Anakites. But the Lord destroyed the Rephaim from among the Ammonites. The Ammonites took possession of their land and lived there in their place. 22 The Lord had done the same things for the people of Esau, who live in Seir, when he destroyed the Horites before them, and they took possession of their land and settled there in their place and remain there to this day. 23 Now the Caphtorites, who came out of Caphtor,[d] destroyed the Avvites who were living in villages as far as Gaza and settled in their place.)
Confrontation With the Amorites
24 Then the Lord told us:[e] “Get ready to travel and cross over the Arnon Canyon. See, I have given into your hands Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, and his land. Start to take possession of it and wage war against him. 25 This very day I will begin to put dread and fear of you on the faces of the people everywhere under heaven, so that they will hear reports about you and they will tremble, and they will be shaking because of you.”
26 So I sent messengers from the Wilderness of Kedmoth to Sihon king of Heshbon with an offer of peace. I said, 27 “Let us pass through your land. We will proceed only on the road. We will not turn aside to the right or to the left. 28 You can sell us food in exchange for money so we can eat, and you can give us water in exchange for money so we can drink. Only let us pass through on foot, 29 as did the people of Esau living in Seir and the Moabites living in Ar, until we can cross over the Jordan into the land that the Lord our God is giving us.”
30 But Sihon king of the Amorites was not willing to let us pass through on the road, because the Lord your God gave him a stubborn attitude by making his heart obstinate, in order to give him over into your hands, as is now the case today. 31 Then the Lord said to me, “Look now, I have begun to give you Sihon and his land. Start taking action to take possession of his land.”
32 Then Sihon and all of his people went out to meet us in battle at Jahaz. 33 The Lord our God gave him to us, and we struck him down, as well as his sons and all his people. 34 So we captured each of his cities at that time. We devoted each city to destruction, with the men, women, and children. We did not leave a survivor. 35 We took only the livestock as plunder for ourselves, as well as the spoils of war from the cities that we captured. 36 From Aroer, which is on the edge of the Arnon Canyon, from the city that is in the canyon, all the way up to Gilead, there was not a city that was out of reach for us. The Lord our God gave us everything. 37 But it was only the land of the people of Ammon that you did not approach: the land along both sides of the Jabbok Canyon, the cities of the hill country, and everything that the Lord our God had forbidden us to take.
Psalm 83
Surrounded by Enemies
Heading
A song. A psalm by Asaph.
Opening Plea
1 God, do not keep silent.
Do not be deaf. Do not be quiet, God.
A Catalog of Enemies
2 Look! Your enemies are in an uproar,
and those who hate you have raised their head.
3 Against your people they devise deceptive schemes,
and they plot together against the people you treasure.
4 They say, “Come, let us wipe them out as a nation,
so the name of Israel will not be remembered anymore.”
5 Indeed, with one mind they plot together.
They form an alliance against you—
6 the tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites,
Moab and the Hagrites,
7 Gebal[a] and Ammon and Amalek,
Philistia, with the inhabitants of Tyre.
8 Even Ashshur has joined with them. Interlude
They have become the arm of the sons of Lot.[b]
Prayer for Destruction of the Enemies
9 Do to them as you did to Midian,
as you did to Sisera and Jabin at the stream Kishon.
10 They perished at Endor.
They became like manure for the ground.
11 Make their nobles like Oreb and like Zeeb,
all their princes like Zebah and Zalmunna,
12 who said, “Let us take possession of God’s pastures for ourselves.”
13 My God, make them like tumbleweed,
like chaff before the wind.
14 As fire burns the forest,
or as a flame sets the mountains on fire,
15 so pursue them with your violent wind,
and terrify them with your storm.
16 Fill their faces with shame
so that they will seek your name, O Lord.
17 May they be ashamed and terrified forever.
May they be disgraced and perish.
18 Let them know that you, whose name is the Lord,
you alone are the Most High over all the earth.
Psalm 84
How Loved Is Your Dwelling Place
Heading
For the choir director. According to gittith.[c] By the Sons of Korah.[d]
A psalm.
How Loved Is Your Dwelling Place
1 How I love your dwelling place, O Lord of Armies.
2 My soul grows weak and even wastes away,
as I long for the courtyards of the Lord.
My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
3 Even the sparrow has found a home,
and the swallow has found a nest for herself,
where she may place her young near your altars,
O Lord of Armies, my King and my God.
The Blessings of Being There
4 How blessed are those who live in your house. Interlude
They are always praising you.
5 How blessed is everyone whose strength is found in you.
The highways to Jerusalem[e] are in their hearts.
6 As they pass through the Valley of Baca,[f]
it becomes full of springs.[g]
The autumn rain also covers it with pools.[h]
7 They go from strength to strength.
Each one will appear before God in Zion.
Prayer
8 O Lord, God of Armies, hear my prayer. Interlude
Give ear, O God of Jacob.
9 Look upon our Shield, O God.
Look with favor on the face of your Anointed One.[i]
The Blessings of Being There
10 Yes, one day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere.
I would rather wait at the doorway of the house of my God
than dwell in the tents of the wicked.
11 For the Lord is a sun and shield.
God gives grace and glory.
The Lord does not withhold any good thing
from those who walk with integrity.
12 O Lord of Armies, how blessed is everyone who trusts in you.
A Useless Treaty With Egypt
30
Woe to this rebellious people, says the Lord.
They take advice, but not from me.
They establish an alliance, but not by my Spirit.
Then they sin more and more.
2 Woe to those who go down to Egypt, without consulting me.
They seek Pharaoh’s protection,
and they take refuge in the shade of Egypt!
3 So Pharaoh’s protection will bring you shame.
Taking refuge in the shade of Egypt will be your downfall.
4 Even though Israel’s officials are in Zoan,
and their envoys have gone as far as Hanes,
5 they will all be humiliated
because of a people that is useless to them.
They can neither help nor provide any benefit.
They bring only shame and reproach.
Judah’s Envoys Take Tribute to Egypt
6 An oracle about the animals of the Negev.
Through the land of trouble and distress,
the land of the lioness and the lion,
of the viper and the venomous flying serpent,
Judah’s envoys carry their wealth on the backs of donkeys
and their treasures on camels’ humps,
to a nation that cannot help them.
7 For Egypt’s help is useless and serves no purpose.
That is why I have called her “the dragon that just sits there.”[a]
8 Go and write it on a tablet for them.
Record it on a scroll,
so that in the future it may serve as a permanent witness.
9 These are a rebellious people, lying children,
children unwilling to hear the law of the Lord,
10 who tell the seers, “Stop seeing!”
who tell the prophets, “Stop prophesying what is right!
Tell us pleasant things. Prophesy illusions.
11 Leave the way! Turn from the path!
Stop getting in our face about the Holy One of Israel!”
12 This is what the Holy One of Israel says:
Since you have rejected my word,
and you trust in oppression and deceit,
and you rely on them,
13 your guilt will be like a crack in a wall,
bulging out and about to collapse.
It will suddenly fall without warning.
14 It will crash like a broken clay pot,
smashed to pieces so violently that not one useful piece will be left,
not even a piece good enough to pick up a coal from the hearth
or to ladle water from a cistern.
15 This is what the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, says:
If you repent and wait quietly, you will be saved.
Your strength will depend on quietness and trust.
But you refused.
16 You said, “No, we will flee on horseback!”
Yes indeed, you will flee.
You said, “We will ride away swiftly!”
Yes indeed, you will be pursued swiftly.
17 A thousand will flee when just one threatens.
When five threaten, you will flee,
until you are like a single flag, fluttering on a mountaintop,
like a lonely banner on a hill.
18 But the Lord is eager to be gracious to you.
He waits on high to have mercy on you,
for the Lord is a God of justice.
Blessed are all those who long for him.
19 So people will live in Zion. In Jerusalem you will weep no more. The Lord will be very gracious to you when he hears your cry. When he hears you, he will answer you. 20 Though the Lord has given you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, he is your teacher.[b] He will not be hidden any longer. You will see your teacher with your own eyes. 21 Whenever you are tempted to turn to the right or to the left, you will hear his voice behind you, saying, “This is the way. Walk in it.” 22 You will defile your idols that are plated with silver and your images overlaid with gold. You will throw them away like a filthy cloth,[c] saying, “Get away from me!”
23 Then he will give you rain so that you can sow seed in the ground. The bread from your land’s harvest will be excellent and plentiful. On that day your livestock will graze in wide pastures. 24 The oxen and the donkeys that work the ground will eat the best feed[d]—winnowed with a shovel and a winnowing fork. 25 On every lofty mountain and on every high hill there will be streams flowing with water.
It will be a day of terrible slaughter, when towers fall. 26 The light of the moon will be as bright as the sun, and the light of the sun will be seven times brighter—like the light of seven days—on the day when the Lord will bind up the wounds of his people and heal the injuries he inflicted.
God Will Punish Assyria
27 Look! The name of the Lord is coming from far away,
burning with anger, in a column of thick smoke.
His lips are full of anger,
and his tongue is a consuming fire.
28 His breath is a stream at flood stage,
surging all the way up to your neck.
He shakes the nations in a sieve to destroy them,
and he puts a bridle in their mouths to lead them to destruction.
29 You will sing as you do on the night of a holy festival,
with glad hearts,
as when they go up with flutes to the mountain of the Lord,
to the Rock of Israel.
30 The Lord will cause the majestic splendor of his voice to be heard.
He will make them see his arm come crashing down in fierce anger,
like the flames of a consuming fire,
like driving rain, a furious storm with hailstones.
31 The voice of the Lord will terrify Assyria.
He will strike it with his rod.
32 Every stroke of the punishing rod[e] which the Lord will lay on them
will be accompanied by the music of drums and lyres.
He himself will fight, battling them, swinging weapons.
33 Topheth has long been made ready.
It is prepared for the king,
a flaming funeral pyre, deep and wide, with plenty of wood.
The breath of the Lord, like a river of liquid fire, sets it ablaze.
Greeting
Jude, a servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James,
To those who are called, who are loved[a] in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ:
2 Mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you.
Ungodly Teachers Who Slipped In Secretly
3 Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you concerning the salvation we share, I felt it was necessary for me to write, to urge you to continue to contend for the faith that was delivered to the saints once and for all. 4 For certain individuals slipped in secretly, about whom it was written some time ago that they are condemned. They are ungodly people who turn the grace of our God into a license for sin and deny our only Master[b] and Lord, Jesus Christ.
5 I want to remind you, though you already know all these things, that after the Lord[c] rescued his people out of the land of Egypt, he later destroyed those who did not believe. 6 And the angels who did not keep their position of authority but left their own dwelling place behind—God has kept them in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day. 7 Like Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, who in a similar way indulged in extreme sexual immorality and pursued homosexual perversion,[d] they serve as an example of those who are going to suffer the punishment of eternal fire.
8 Yet, in the very same way, these dreamers are defiling the flesh, despising authority, and blaspheming glorious ones. 9 But when the archangel Michael was disputing with the Devil and arguing about the body of Moses, he did not dare to bring a blasphemous condemnation against him. Instead he said, “The Lord rebuke you!”
10 But these people do not understand what they are blaspheming. They are being destroyed by the very things that they know by instinct (like unreasoning animals). 11 Woe to them! They have gone the way of Cain. They have abandoned themselves for hire to the error of Balaam. They perished in Korah’s rebellion.
12 These people are filthy stains on[e] your love feasts when they eat with you without fear, shepherding themselves. They are clouds without rain, being driven along by the winds. They are autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, pulled up by the roots. 13 They are wild waves of the sea piling up the foam of their own shame. They are wandering stars for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved for eternity.
14 Enoch, the seventh from Adam, also prophesied about these people, saying, “Look, the Lord is going to come with tens of thousands of his holy ones, 15 to execute judgment against all of them and to convict every soul concerning all their ungodly deeds, which they did in an ungodly way, and concerning all the harsh words that ungodly sinners spoke against him.” 16 These are discontented grumblers, who walk according to their lusts, and their mouths speak boastful things as they flatter others to take advantage of them.
Keep Yourselves in God’s Love
17 But you, dear friends, remember the words that were spoken earlier by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ. 18 They said to you, “In the last time there will be scoffers who follow their own ungodly lusts.”[f] 19 These are the people who cause divisions. They are worldly because they do not have the Spirit.
20 But you, dear friends, continue to build yourselves up in your most holy faith as you keep praying in the Holy Spirit. 21 Keep yourselves in God’s love as you continue to wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, which results in eternal life. 22 Show mercy to those who are wavering.[g] 23 Save others by snatching them out of the fire. Show mercy to still others with fear,[h] hating even the clothing that is stained by the flesh.
24 Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you faultless in the presence of his glory with great joy, 25 to the only[i] God, our Savior, be glory, majesty, power, and authority through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all time, now, and to all eternity. Amen.
The Holy Bible, Evangelical Heritage Version®, EHV®, © 2019 Wartburg Project, Inc. All rights reserved.